The MSA of Tolkien
by Armelle-Madeline
Summary: With anyone decent accepted into the FU's, the MSA begins to take in the dregs of fanfic, and educate them in the true Mary Sue. There will be fangirls, convenient devices, and dangerous Mary Sues. You have been warned
1. Of new students and universities

Disclaimer number one: I am not Tolkien, or heirs, so I do not own the characters, or wonderful world of LOTR, just a poor student you really shouldn't sue. I'm just borrowing a little bit  
  
Disclaimer number two: I do not own the concept of fanfiction universities. All mentions of the 'Official Universities' are mentions of the brain children of Camilla Sandman, I do not own, and if I borrow, I do so with the full intention of returning it, unscathed.  
  
Disclaimer number three: Miss Cam has given permission for the writing of this story. References to objects in her story, or concepts are hers, and hers alone, or the product of the spin offs written by HonorH and Meir Brin.  
  
A/N: This is a light parody. The opinions expressed in the defense of Mary Sue, and her spawn are not my own. Do not kill me.  
  
The MSA of Tolkien- Or writing a Mary Sue as a complete cliché  
  
The halls of Rohan were empty, and silent, for the last time in a while, Armelle observed grimly. With interest, she noted that the carvings, and gold inlay was even more intricately done than she'd imagined in the books. It sparkled in the sunlight streaming in through the high windows, dust dancing across the stone flagons.  
  
It was beautiful, a huge hall decorated for a King, and so it was with a sigh of regret that Armelle pulled a tiny box from her pocket, and held it out in her palm. There was just time to catch the embossed letters 'M' and 'S' entwined on the top of the box before the lid snapped back and the contents were exposed.  
  
It was filled with dust that glowed oddly in the light of the room. One minute it glinted gold, the next raven-black, then bright sapphire, and next emerald green. If you looked at it too long, a strange sense of peace, and complete detachment settled over the watcher, and strings of thoughts, like, 'Leggy is soo hot' began to thread through the mind.  
  
With great caution, the woman took a pinch of the substance, and at arm's length, scattered it in a careless circle. The room seemed to quiver a little, then settle, and sadly, Armelle watched the carvings dim from their bright polish to a dull, uninteresting plain wood.  
  
Closing the box with a flick of her hand, Armelle strolled the length of the hall once more, stopping in front of a banner hung across the back wall. In bright red stitches, a phrase was displayed, but written in a strange script, with curving letters. A small smile quirked on her lips. MSA had not even begun, yet.  
  
Chloe added a couple of lines about the dress her new character, Elbeth was wearing. She was actually pretty pleased name-wise, it sounded vaguely Elfish, and she'd thrown in some stuff about being an Elf of Lothlorian, and foreshadowed a little bit about Galadriel. Elbeth was her servant at the moment, but with an introduction to a certain tall, blonde elf, with a smile that could melt Chloe's heart after the twentieth re-watching of the movie, Elbeth would soon be Mrs Legolas Greenleaf.  
  
Her IM icon jumped up and down on the corner of the screen, and she clicked on it. An IM from 'MSA' appeared.  
  
'Click me', the words said encouragingly. Chloe shrugged. The mental abilities of this writer, Chloe, cannot be described as anything above 'miniscule' at this point in time. Clicking on links from random IM messages are possibly not a good idea, but no-one ever said that Mary Sue writers were Mensa standard. She is excused a small amount, however, as the num-dust was already starting to take effect.  
  
The room lurched, as did Chloe's stomach, and her last real thought before she fell on her stomach onto cold stone was that perhaps clicking on links wasn't such a good idea.  
  
The chatter echoed off the hall's high ceiling, as hundreds of girls (and the occasional guy) stood in large clumps, talking amongst themselves in the huge room. Chloe picked herself up, her current bewilderment sky- rocketing. She looked around, taking in the thick stone walls, covered in wooden stuff, and wall hangings, but before she could even get her bearings, a gruff voice cleared its throat.  
  
Standing at waist level, looking slightly like a dwarf and at the same time like a hobbit was a woman, dressed in a nondescript outfit that appeared vaguely hobbit-like. She was also holding a clipboard in one hand, and a pen in the other.  
  
"Name?" she asked matter-of-factly.  
  
"Chloe Greenleaf," Chloe said proudly. She'd tried out Mrs Legolas for a while, but it didn't have the same zing to it.  
  
The hobbit/dwarf woman rolled her eyes, and sighed heavily, tucking her clipboard under her arm.  
  
"Welcome to the Mary Sue Academy of Tolkien," she began in a bored voice. "Like others, you have been selected based on number of spawn, and settings, quality, and quantity. Stay here is completely optional, if you can find a way to leave."  
  
"Find a way?" Chloe repeated dumbly.  
  
"Well, there's always out there," Armelle joined the conversation, with a nod to the main door, "But the Riders of Rohan seem to be resisting num- dust, and I wouldn't like to try that way unarmed." She smiled calmly at Chloe, glancing at the clipboard the short woman held out for her, and nodded.  
  
"The first batch is all here," Armelle stated, then handed the clipboard back. "Good. Thank you, Estar." She turned to Chloe.  
  
"As Estar was telling you, you are of course free to find your way home. We wouldn't keep you here, by any means."  
  
"What is this?" Chloe spluttered, looking up again at the ceiling, the banners, the carvings, and the other people crowding into the room. For a large hall, Armelle noted, as she followed the girl's gaze, it was beginning to be distinctly over-crowded.  
  
"This is a Mary Sue Academy," Armelle shrugged, as if perfectly obvious. "To teach Mary Sue authors the true way of Mary Sue fic." She began listing on her fingers. "Common Elfish names, locations, CPD's," she broke off at Chloe's confused expression, and explained, kindly, "Convenient Plot Devices. The rules of Tolkien, and breaking them, canon, and shooting out of it, lustings, and of course, languages."  
  
"But why-" Chloe stuttered. Armelle's smile broadened.  
  
"Well, when the Universities sprang up, any one half decent started learning to write. And to give them a constant supply of authors to punish, we started up, to teach the dregs how to write a true Mary Sue." She shrugged. "You'd be surprised what little gems people can come up with."  
  
A dreamy-looking young woman, with her long blonde hair tucked behind prominent pointed ears, drifted over.  
  
"Here's your guide," Armelle gestured to the obviously elfin newcomer. "Gala will show you to your room."  
  
She strode off in the opposite direction, leaving Chloe following Gala, thoroughly confused, bemused, discombobulated and others besides, hoping faintly that this was all a dream.  
  
A/N: Willing victims- I mean, students for the academy, sign up to the email on my profile page. I need a name, race, 'ship, and category of fic most popular. Your alter egos will be used mercilessly to poke fun. You have been warned.  
  
And now, to keep the fic going, review. 


	2. Problems and orientation

A/N: If your preferred username is used in the course of the fic, please let me know, and I will withdraw it.  
  
If you wish to enrol in the Mary Sue Academy of Tolkien, then send an email, or place a request in your review for a form.  
  
* * * * *  
  
Before Gala took Chloe anywhere near resembling a dormitory, the short woman, Estar, handed the tall, and willowy Elf the clipboard.  
  
"Thems the list," she said gruffly. "All of 'em are in Celebrian dorm." A group of ten or so stood behind Estar, glancing at one another nervously, then away. Chloe met the eyes of one or two, and smiled shyly at them.  
  
Gala nodded gravely, and swept away, gliding across the floor, the clipboard tucked under her arm. Like a trail of ducklings, all of 'them' followed her, as she led them through the hidden door beside the great throne, and along a narrow, chilly corridor.  
  
Thick oak doors lined the corridor, and Gala stopped before one on the left, and opened it. Chloe and the others shuffled in.  
  
It was a large room, with twelve beds, with a lumpy looking mattress, and thin blanket on each. There was a low table beside each bed, on which stood a water goblet, and at the far end of the room was a long chest, on which stood twelve laptops. It was stark, except for a woven hanging on the wall above the beds, with the same strange words embroidered across it.  
  
"This is Celebrian dormitory," Gala said solemnly. "On the Angst corridor. You each have a computer assigned to you," she gestured to the rank of laptops, "You will use them for each assignment. There is a meeting in the Hall at nine."  
  
She drifted out, pulling the door closed behind her.  
  
A few moments of silence passed by, before anyone spoke. Then a girl with short, spiked red hair smiled a little.  
  
"I think we're kinda supposed to get to know one another. Hi, I'm Lu. Lutheniel."  
  
"Moondancer," volunteered another, raising her hand. Moondancer dropped onto a bed, bouncing on it a little.  
  
"Wormlip," another chipped in. They all turned to look at her. She shrugged.  
  
"Chloe," Chloe said, glancing at the rank of laptops. Lu followed her gaze.  
  
"I've been thinking about getting my own," she said happily, walking over and picking up a shiny new laptop. "Maybe they'll let us keep them, afterwards." She flipped it over. "Oh."  
  
On the bottom of the laptop, in large, swirly pink letters, was engraved, 'Property of MSA of Tolkien. Do not remove'. Lu sat down on the bed, with a sigh of regret. "Guess not, then."  
  
"So, what kind of fic have you been hauled in for?" Wormlip addressed Chloe. It reminded Chloe distinctly of prison-movie type dialogue.  
  
"I don't know. I don't write that badly, you know. I'm still a little confused on what this whole project is," Chloe confided. Wormlip gave a short laugh.  
  
"Never heard of fanfiction academies, universities and such before, then?" she drawled, with a wry smile on her face. She shook her head regretfully. "I've been around a few flamers who have seen the places. We're in hell."  
  
"Hell?" Chloe queried, looking at Lu. The redhead nodded, slowly.  
  
"Learning through pain," Lu said, her voice soft. "Motto of the universities." She shivered.  
  
The door opened onto the room once more, and Gala stood there, her clipboard in hand.  
  
"You'd better get some sleep," she advised, in her low voice. "Classes and scheduling begin tomorrow."  
  
Chloe, pulling the thin blanket over her, tried dismally to make it more effective, and failed, gave up, and fell asleep, very grateful that on her fiction-mission, she'd been wearing her thick flannel pyjamas.  
  
Armelle paced the floor, her hands clasped behind her back as she strode, her face creased in thought. Gala and Estar, the two deputy heads of staff waited calmly. They were well used to the woman's pattern of behaviour.  
  
"You've sent off the rest of the letters, then?" she directed the question to Gala. The elf nodded.  
  
"Good. And the fanfiction universities are aware of our presence, and the dangers of getting too near?" this time, the question was addressed to Estar. The semi-hobbit cleared her throat.  
  
"Miss Cam of the Official Fanfiction of Middle-Earth has acknowledged us. We've managed to get the main wards up around the grounds, to keep the num- dust in, and the Mary Sues, but if the students start plot-digging like mad, we're going to come up against a crisis. We can stop them spawning, but if those hard drives get anywhere near a plot hole, we'll be finished. Crossovers are tricky enough without letting canon-less writers near it, particularly in a high-Sue area."  
  
Armelle considered it. The problem was, as far as the assignments went, when Sues would be spawned, but under controlled circumstances, with precautions taken, the ground had been secured in such a way, that any Suvian influence could not leak out. The quarantine barriers needed to be strong, to stop num-dust infecting the surroundings, but it meant that if feed-back built up, the Academy would become too explosive to maintain.  
  
"What we really need is a day a week, where the Mary Sues are destroyed. Hmm," she mused, thinking it over. "Or some way of getting rid of it all, a hole in the barriers. It's potentially risky, and at this stage, stopping Mary Sue-age is impossible. The breeds they're producing are dangerous, far more so than the ones they'll produce in a month or so. I'll have to look it over. How are the students settling in?"  
  
Gala's smile was a bit too satisfied for an elf, and her eyes glinted with amusement. "The Angst corridor's thermostat is set to 'bleak'. We'll turn it up as it comes. Romance across the hall-" Gala gave a shudder. "We'll need to keep all Elf staff away. Female staff patrolling only, and it would be better to stick to the humans."  
  
Armelle smiled in approval. "All right. I'll send out a memo. Canon characters have been reminded not to come near the main grounds except the restricted zones, haven't they? I'd hate to have to write to Miss Cam, to see if I could borrow the Balrogs for our writers."  
  
Her mind roved over the ranks of the unsuspecting authors. Some of them had come across fanfiction universities before, no matter. The Academy was an entirely different prospect.  
  
"I think that's all. Eru, I hope this works," she muttered, suddenly nervous. Unleashing the authors' potential would be very, very difficult. She glanced up at the banner, hanging in the staff-room, as it did everywhere in the school, re-reading it. It was the perfect addition to the school, after all, since when could semi-literate Suvian-authors read Westron?  
  
The clang of a very, very loud bell was the wakening call of the students of MSAT. Chloe groaned, and pulled the pillow over her head, trying to ignore it. Estar strolled into the room, looking extraordinarily happy for her, they would discover, as she rang the bell triumphantly inside their dorm room.  
  
"Up," she ordered. "Breakfast, then orientation."  
  
It is a well-known fact amongst fanfiction authors that few can exist without caffeine. Therefore, it was with shock that the sleepy, and primarily dead-looking writers discovered that coffee was a dream that would not be materialising in MSAT's cafeteria.  
  
"Why?" a short girl, with shoulder-length curly hair bewailed, (someone whom Chloe had a sneaking suspicion had put down 'hobbit' as her species) looking in horror from the jugs of water, milk, and ale on the long table that served as a counter, to the serene Elf Lady behind it. Ravana's expression remained unchanged as she replied, in the same low, sweet tones as the other Elvin members of staff,  
  
"Because."  
  
"How are we supposed to survive?" Moondancer said aghast, examining a glass of milk as if it were poison.  
  
"Your characters do not have coffee," Armelle said brightly, from just behind them, making Moondancer and Chloe jump. "They seem to be able to cope."  
  
"That's fiction!" Moondancer exclaimed. "They're not writers." Armelle merely smiled, and made her way over to the staff table, on a dais above the long tables and benches of the students, saying something under her breath that Chloe could have sworn was, 'Neither are you, dear."  
  
As they were all coming to a halt, Armelle stood up, and waited for silence.  
  
"Students," she began, looking from one table to another. "Welcome again, to the Academy. I am Miss Armelle, head of staff, and courses here at MSAT. You can see the staff here. This is Gala," she indicated the tall, blond elf, who stood up, bowed her head, and sat down again, "And Estar," the half-hobbit rose, nodded briefly, and sat back down, "Deputy heads. Once breakfast is over, make your way to the office, where copies of your schedule are obtainable. Classes begin at ten this morning, nine normally. Do not be late, or you will be on clean-up duty, in the Creature section, and I am informed this is not pleasurable."  
  
She smiled once more. "Dismissed."  
  
A/N: Next chapter, classes begin. A few clarifications.  
  
OFUM - Original Fanfiction University of Middle-Earth, by Camilla Sandman, referred to as "Miss Cam". Various spin offs are referred to as 'OFU', Original Fanfiction Universities.  
  
MS- Mary Sues.  
  
Num-dust- said to be the powdered bones of a variety of infamous Sues, num- dust is very difficult to define, due to its ever changing colour. Produces a Mary-Sue effect on anything in contact with it, and is highly dangerous.  
  
Balrogs- creation of Miss Cam, mini creatures that like to cause pain. 


End file.
